European Commission Criticizes Cyprus for Lack Of Consultation

Threat to Reforms:EU Criticizes Cyprus for Lack of Consultation

AP/dpa

Demonstrators protesting outside parliament against the terms of the Cypriot bailout in Nicosia last Thursday.

The European Commission has criticized Cyprus for announcing policies that will boost public spending. The country needs to consult its creditors in the future to minimize the impact of its measures on reform progress, the Commission said in a draft report.

The European Commission has criticized the government of Cyprus for increasing public spending without consulting its international creditors first.

In a draft report seen by SPIEGEL, the Commission said Cyprus had announced a number of steps that will boost outlays, such as a plan to grant tax advantages to customers of Cypriot banks to encourage them to shift their capital back to the island.

The troika -- made up of the European Commission, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank -- recently scrutinized the progress Cyprus is making in implementing reforms imposed as a condition for the international bailout of 10 billion ($13.17 billion) given to the small Mediterranean island nation in April.

Under the terms of the bailout, Cyprus shrank its oversized banking sector, the mainstay of its economy, by closing the second biggest bank, Laiki, and restructuring Bank of Cyprus. It also agreed to raise taxes, cut spending and implement structural reforms to improve its public finances and to be able to eventually repay its debt.

The tax measure for bank customers is likely to lead to higher costs for the government budget, the Commission report says.

In the future, the government must inform the troika "to minimize the risk of initiatives that could have a significant impact on the achievement of program targets," the report says.

But it also says that Cyprus is making progress on its reforms.

"The fulfilment of program pledges has begun in all major areas," the report says, but it adds "in the field of budgetary measures and structural reforms the progress has been mixed."

For reasons of data protection and privacy, your IP address will only be stored if you are a registered user of Facebook and you are currently logged in to the service. For more detailed information, please click on the "i" symbol.

This is exactly why a monetary union of 28 independent, sovereign nations is such an unworkable idea. Too many people wish to spend more than they earn and they will do whatever they can to rationalize this behavior until they hit [...]

This is exactly why a monetary union of 28 independent, sovereign nations is such an unworkable idea. Too many people wish to spend more than they earn and they will do whatever they can to rationalize this behavior until they hit rock bottom. Much like a drug addict. It's the same self-deceiving, narcissistic sort of behavior. And Cyprus will continue to act crazy until their German sugar daddy finally cuts them off.

The article you are reading originally appeared in German in issue 37/2013 (September 09, 2013) of DER SPIEGEL.

Click on the links below for more information about DER SPIEGEL's history, how to subscribe or purchase the latest issue of the German-language edition in print or digital form or how to obtain rights to reprint SPIEGEL articles.